Me and Monet

While working on my landscape illustrations, I have been revisiting some of the landscape artists I studied years ago. Claude Monet and the Impressionists (mid 1800’s) have always struck a cord with me. I am particularly drawn to their use of colour, light and textured brush strokes.

A couple of years ago I visited the Neue Pinakothek Art Gallery in Munich. The gallery was exhibiting one of Monet’s artworks from the Water Lilies series. I stood in front of it for a long while, I got a bit lost in the texture of the brush strokes... I’m sure I could almost hear the water.

I have been inspired by Monet’s obsession with the outdoors and the effects of weather and light on a subject. A great example of this is his painting series Haystacks. The idea of doing a series to reflect the change in conditions is something I would really like in incorporate in my Sydney landscape illustrations.

Unlike Monet, I’ve been visiting different locations armed with my camera to capture the lighting effects on a number of subjects, rather than taking multiple canvases out to the fields for hours or days. I’m pretty excited about this project, I’ll publish more as I go.